Sunni Shia relations 300807

Mideast power vacuum ‘benefits Iran’

By Najmeh Bozorgmehr

August 28 2007 23

Iran’s president said on Tuesday that diminished US political influence in the Middle East was creating a ‘power vacuum’ that would benefit Iran and other countries in the region.

Mahmoud Ahmadi-Nejad went on to say that that the US’s “weakening” of the Iraqi government – an apparent reference to recent criticism of prime minister Nouri al-Maliki by senior US politicians – would not help the US maintain control over the country.

The comments are a reminder of Iran’s long-standing ambition to be the top power in the Persian Gulf, as it was before the 1979 Islamic revolution – a nightmare scenario for some of the other countries in the region.

Iran’s nuclear programme – which Tehran says is purely for peaceful purposes – has fuelled Sunni Arab countries’ fears of Shia Iran.

Mr Ahmadi-Nejad was speaking before US president George W. Bush launched a fresh verbal attack on the Tehran regime’s nuclear programme which the US and other western powers believe is designed to produce nuclear weapons.

“Iran’s actions threaten the security of nations everywhere, and the United States is rallying friends and allies to isolate Iran’s regime to impose economic sanctions,” Mr Bush told a US Veteran’s rally. “We will confront this danger before it is too late.”

But Mr Ahmadi-Nejad called for co-operation with some of the regional nations who have expressed concern at its growing influence.

“With the help of neighbours and regional friends like Saudi Arabia, we are ready to fill up this vacuum to the benefit of regional nations and Iraq,” Mr Ahmadi-Nejad said in a press conference. “This is happening… and those who close their eyes are fooling themselves.”

Mr Ahmadi-Nejad downplayed the differences between Iran and Saudi Arabia over Iraq and Lebanon and added that regional co-operation was feasible.

Iran supports the Maliki government and opposes efforts to remove him.

Mr Ahmadi-Nejad warned that changing the Iraq government could “further complicate” the situation for the US accusing the US of fomenting ethnic and sectarian violence in Iraq to “loot” Iraqi and Middle East oil “under the pretext of insecurity” in Iraq.

However, he said Iran-US talks over security in Iraq could still continue.

Responding directly to Mr Ahmadi-Nejad’s comments, US state department spokesman Tom Casey said on Tuesday that the US wanted to see Iran play a more positive role in Iraq but that the president’s remarks reflected “just more of the same Iranian rhetoric that claims to hold down support and friendship for the people of Iraq, while actions, unfortunately, take them in the opposite direction.”

Tensions between Iran and the US have been mounting over Tehran’s nuclear programme and its alleged involvement in backing Shia militia in Iraq, while Mr Ahmadi-Nejad once again reiterated that suspension of uranium enrichment - as demanded by United Nations resolutions - was out of the question.

Iran and the International Atomic Energy Agency, reached an agreement on Monday according to which UN questions about tests with plutonium – fuel for atomic bombs – which Iran says it has no intention to make, were resolved and the UN watchdog considered the issue closed.

Mr Ahmadi-Nejad also shrugged off any possibility of military confrontation but was careful not to make any threats even when he was asked about closing the strategic strait of Hormuz – through which more than 25 per cent of the world’s oil flows: “Intensifying and expanding tensions is not on anyone’s agenda.”

He also doubted the US would put Iran’s revolutionary guards on their list of “terrorist” organisations – a move advocated by some in Washington.

Source: Financial Times

Commentary: The next war?

By ARNAUD DE BORCHGRAVE

After a brief interruption of his New Hampshire vacation to meet President Bush in the family compound at Kennebunkport, Maine, French President Nicolas Sarkozy came away convinced his U.S. counterpart is serious about bombing Iran's secret nuclear facilities. That's the reading as it filtered back to Europe's foreign ministries:

Addressing the annual meeting of France's ambassadors to 188 countries, Sarkozy said either Iran lives up to its international obligations and relinquishes its nuclear ambitions or it will be bombed into compliance. Sarkozy also made clear he did not agree with the Iranian-bomb-or-bombing-of-Iran position, which reflects the pledge Bush made to his loyalists and endorsed by GOP presidential candidate Sen. John McCain and independent Sen. Joe Lieberman. But Sarkozy recognized unless Iran's theocrats stop enriching uranium to weapons-grade levels under International Atomic Energy Agency inspection, we will all be "faced with an alternative that I call catastrophic."

A ranking Swiss official, speaking privately, said, "Anyone with a modicum of experience in the Middle East knows that any bombing of Iran would touch off at the very least regional instability and what could be an unmitigated disaster for Western interests."

Leaks about the Bush administration's plan to brand Iran's 125,000-strong Revolutionary Guards a global terrorist organization are widely interpreted as a major step on the escalator to military action. Belatedly, Saudi Arabia, the world's largest oil producer, has signed a contract with Lockheed Martin for the training of 35,000 elite guards to be assigned to the protection of the kingdom's widely scattered oil installations. With 25 percent of the world's oil reserves, Riyadh has earmarked $5 billion to train and field what will be a high-tech force ASAP. Eighteen months ago the desert kingdom was jolted by an al-Qaida terrorist squad that managed to penetrate the first two layers of defenses at Abqaiq, the nerve center of the entire oil infrastructure.

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has now stated publicly his country holds the key to the conditions of a U.S. withdrawal from Iraq. Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, much criticized by the United States for his lack of leadership and deserted by half his Cabinet, is much praised in Tehran, where he has gone twice in 11 months to confer with Iranian leaders. Ahmadinejad also says Iran is ready to fill the power vacuum in Iraq following a U.S. withdrawal. "The political power of the occupiers is collapsing rapidly," he said, "and soon we will see a huge power vacuum in the region." The United States is not alone in trying to prove Ahmadinejad's geopolitical weather forecast wrong.

Saudi Arabia and its Gulf Cooperation Council allies in the Gulf, Egypt and Jordan are terrified at the idea of Iraq falling under Iranian domination. Hoping to head off a U.S.-Iran military confrontation, European countries are still pinning their hopes on major Iranian concessions at the IAEA in Vienna. Iran is back to cooperating with the IAEA -- but only one comma or semicolon at a time. The three EU countries acting as U.S. surrogates on nuclear matters with Iran and IAEA chief Mohamed ElBaradei detect progress where the United States sees only stalling. Iran is still resisting short-notice inspections of sites that are not officially declared nuclear facilities and where secret nuclear work is believed to be taking place.

Tehran's only objective at the IAEA and the U.N. Security Council is to head off further economic sanctions by its major EU trading partners -- thus, the mantra that its only interest in nuclear matters is as an alternative source of energy in a country already awash in oil taxes credulity.

Both the Bush administration and Israel are painstakingly fashioning a casus belli with Iran. For Israel, the training and weapons support Iran furnishes Hezbollah in Lebanon (now with more rockets of all kinds than it had before the 2006 war when it fired 4,000 into Israel) and Hamas in Gaza (now equipped with Katyusha rockets and a range of 10.6 miles), coupled with Ahmadinejad's existential threats against the Jewish state, are sufficient evidence to justify airstrikes against Iran's nuclear facilities. And for the White House, there is daily evidence of Iran's Revolutionary Guards meddling in Iraq, from improvised explosive devices made in Iran to behind-the-scenes dominance in the affairs of the oil-rich south.

Source: UPI